This list details 2013 American Geophysical Union press events that involve NASA research. Any additional information and multimedia associated with briefings will be posted online by the time of each event. You may access that information using the links tied to each press event title.

General information for news media provided by AGU, including instructions on how reporters can register to participate in the briefings online, can be viewed here.

Unless otherwise noted all AGU press events will take place at the press briefing room in Moscone West, Room 3000. The meeting requires registration with official media credentials.

NASA's small explorer IRIS was launched on June 27, 2013. Its images and spectra of the solar chromosphere and transition region reveal a new window into the dynamics and energetics of the low solar atmosphere that play a pivotal role in heating the solar atmosphere, accelerating the solar wind, and driving solar eruptive events. The IRIS observations reveal a wealth of violent solar eruptive events in unprecedented resolution and are making it possible for the first time to study these explosive phenomena in enough detail to determine their role in heating the outer solar atmosphere. › Associate Feature Story

NASA Mars rover Curiosity is examining evidence about ancient Martian environmental conditions that were favorable for microbial life. Findings are also pertinent to future searches for Martian biosignatures and for future human missions to Mars. › Associate Feature Story

NASA will host a media teleconference to discuss the new findings from the Mars Science Laboratory Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD) aboard the rover Curiosity presented at the AGU meeting. For dial-in information, media should e-mail their name, affiliation and telephone number to Rachel Kraft at rachel.h.kraft@nasa.gov by 8 a.m. PST on Dec. 9. Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live on NASA's website at http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio.

Scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and participating universities and water management agencies in California and Colorado have completed the first year of operations using a prototype airborne system that maps the snowpack of major mountain watersheds to more accurately determine how much water as snow they hold and how fast melt water will come out of the watersheds. In 2013, NASA’s Airborne Snow Observatory performed unprecedented mapping of the Tuolumne River Basin and its Hetch Hetchy reservoir in the Sierra Nevada, the primary water supply for 2.6 million San Francisco Bay Area residents; and the Uncompahgre watershed, part of the Upper Colorado River Basin that supplies water to much of the western United States. In this briefing, scientists will discuss how the City of San Francisco’s Hetch Hetchy operation used the data to optimize reservoir filling and hydroelectric generation at its O’Shaughnessy Dam this year during California’s severe drought. Scientists will also discuss how the technology is improving understanding of snow and its melt, and how it can be applied worldwide. › Associate Feature Story

With remote sensing satellites including Landsat 8, researchers have recorded new measurements of the Earth's coldest temperatures. The satellite imagery not only allows scientists to take the temperature of these inhospitable locations, but figure out what sort of weather brings on the record-breaking cold.

Participants:

Ted Scambos, National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES), University of Colorado Boulder

From the coldest place on Earth to the surface lakes of Saturn’s moon Titan, NASA research being presented at the AGU meeting reveals amazing new stories about life in our solar system. The results shed light on how life evolved, how human activities on Earth can impact life on a planetary scale, and how human life might extend beyond Earth in the not-so-distant future. Reporters are invited to an interview opportunity with NASA's top scientists to discuss agency findings and programs across the Earth and space sciences. NASA Booth (#325), AGU Exhibit Hall, Moscone Center North.

Scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., and Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego have developed new systems to improve real-time warnings of natural hazards like earthquakes, tsunamis and extreme weather events. The enhanced systems have been used by weather forecasters in Southern California to issue flood warnings and are being integrated into emergency warning systems in San Diego, including monitoring of hospitals and bridges. There are plans to expand the system throughout the western United States.› Associate Feature Story

Juno's AGU briefing will present data acquired by NASA's Juno spacecraft during its Earth flyby and will describe the scientific goals of Juno at Jupiter. A low-resolution Earth flyby movie will be released, as well as results from the mission’s outreach campaign inviting amateur radio operators to “Say Hi to Juno” as it passed Earth.

There has been a continual spacecraft presence at Mars since 1997. The longevity of spacecraft missions examining the Red Planet has enabled detection and examination of changes on multiple time scales. Active processes include planet-encircling dust storms about every three to four Mars years, evolution of the polar caps, fresh impacts, migrating sand, and a suite of processes on slopes, some of which may involve liquid water. The distribution of shallow ice is much better known, with implications for recent climate change. The longer the observations continue, the deeper the understanding grows about active processes on Mars. › Associate Feature Story

Scientists will report on observations of Comet ISON both before and during its closest approach to the Sun on Nov. 27-29, 2013. The comet was clearly visible in the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) and the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO), and changes in brightness throughout the passage can help scientists determine what the comet was made of. The panel will share data from these results, as well as from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), to present a picture of ISON’s trip around the Sun, which appears to have led to its demise. The panel will also report on why ISON was not seen in images from the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). › Associate Feature Story

Panelists will discuss 12 years of results using the Sounding of the Atmosphere using Broadband Emission Radiometry, or SABER, aboard the NASA's TIMED spacecraft. SABER results of the upper atmosphere, and the two-peaked solar cycle we now see in the atmosphere and how this data is critical to understanding the natural variability of the atmosphere as the requisite first step in understanding trends in temperature, composition, and energetics due to increasing CO2.

More than 20 years after the Montreal Protocol agreement limited human emissions of ozone-depleting substances, the question remains: is the stratospheric ozone hole over Antarctica recovering? Scientists will present new observations from under the hood of the ozone hole, revealing the internal workings of the annual phenomenon. Why were the holes of 2006 and 2011 so large, and why was the hole of 2012 so small? Drawing from the new observations and analyses, the researchers will provide an update on the status of the ozone hole as well as projected trends.

Titan as You've Never Seen it Before: New Results from NASA's Cassini Mission to SaturnTime: Thursday, Dec. 12, 11:30 a.m. PST

Saturn's moon Titan is the only place in our solar system other than Earth known to have a surface dotted with stable bodies of liquid, which take the form of hydrocarbon lakes and seas. With additional flybys of Titan completed this year by NASA's Cassini spacecraft and the development of a new way to analyze data from the radar mapper, Cassini's science team has put together new views of Titan's northern land of lakes. The new results have given Cassini scientists a better understanding of this Earth-like region and its history.